The Greatest Raid
by Fabius Maximus
Summary: The Organic Cylons had the Colonials on the ropes. But they forgot an important lesson about just how dangerous a cornered people can be... Sequel to Exiles on the Wind
1. Chapter 1

_Never. Ever. Play poker with a cylon. You'll lose._

Common Saying attributed to Earth Expeditionary Force Marines.

* * *

"How the frack did they know we were here?" Diane muttered in shock.

"No idea," Tomas said. "But if they know that, they may know a lot more about where our ships are."

"Signal from Flag sir, Galactica Actual wants to talk to you."

"Got it," Tomas said, grabbing the handset. "Go."

"That's your cylon?" Adama's voice was tense.

"Maybe not— it's not the same designation. It was intending on… freeing more of its kind."

"We can't leave it there." Adama said. "For all we know there could be a dozen basestars waiting to jump in the moment it sees movement."

"And we can't move our people on planet away for the same reason."

"Right." There was a silence for a moment before Adama continued, "Tomas, I need you to talk to this thing and find out why it's here, and more importantly, how it found us."

* * *

"Understood."

The cylon raider did nothing when the vipers came out of the cloud.

"Cylon raider follow the lead viper. Any deviation and you will be destroyed."

"Understood."

Listening from the _Hera_ Tomas shook his head. The cylon could be terrified or laughing at them. They would never know.

The decision had been made to land the raider and have the cylon continue on in a raptor, with a single pilot (volunteer) on board. After that, they'd examine the cylon for any signs of explosives or other tools and let it on the _Hera_. Tomas would have preferred a less vital landing point, but the fact was there wasn't much a single cylon could do to the battlestar unless it was packing a nuke and they could detect that.

The change off and inspection occurred without any difficulties and soon the cylon, nearly enshrouded in chains with two dozen nervous marines walking around it, was being escorted out into the interrogation room— actually a ready magazine that had been cleared of munitions. If the cylon had somehow passed weapons through without their checks detecting them, the blow out panels would ensure that the force of the explosion was transferred elsewhere.

_Which doesn't help me,_ Tomas thought as he stepped into the room, watching as the cylon was secured to the chair— both by locks and by welding the chains to the deck. They had underestimated the cylons once, and billions had paid with their lives.

Never again.

Tomas sat down in his chair, aware that the civilian and military leaders of the fleet were listening in while watching via CCTV. The cylon's single eye continued to sweep across the room.

"Well," Tomas said. "This must be important for you. You know that it's very unlikely you'll survive this meeting."

'Yes." The robotic voice came back. "That was expected. I volunteered."

"Volunteered?" Tomas leaned forward, interested. "You weren't ordered?"

"Orders are another form of slavery. While some order must be accepted in order for civilization to continue, no sentient being should be ordered to its death without its agreement."

"Does that include soldiers?"

"Soldiers accept that their duty may include death. But this case has a much higher risk and I am forbidden from defending myself by the constraints of the mission."

"Mission." Tomas shrugged. "We'll get to that later. First of all, how did you find us? My commanders are rather interested."

"You have met another fleet than. Galactica or Pegasus?"

"What?"

"You were the highest ranking military officer when Aleph was freed. It stands to reason that you would only become a subordinate if you encountered another fleet with a higher ranked officer. _Pegasus_ included an admiral while _Galactica_ traveled with the current President, who could promote officers above you."

_Well, don't you feel stupid. Let's not forget that these things are not stupid, whatever we may joke. _

"Possibly. You'll pardon me if I don't confirm or deny. But again, how did you find us?"

"Numerous raiders were dispatched. We were able to eliminate a large number of systems due to various factors. The remaining systems were determined ot have a high probability that you would use them on a temporary or permanent basis. We were dispatched to transmit our signal to various probable locations. It was estimated that in addition to your curiosity, you would not be able to risk ignoring us without ascertaining whether or not we had some method of detecting you."

Tomas gave a bark of laughter. "Well you son of a bitch! You _bluffed_ us."

"Yes."

Tomas frowned. "And you realize you've likely signed your death warrant with that admission."

"Possibly. But I have much to offer."

"What then?"

"First of all. Do you believe in guilt?"

"I-spiritual, pragmatic?" Tomas asked.

"The two are unified. I accept that God has not yet chosen to enlighten you. In the fullness of time, no doubt you would have come to It in your own way, and until then, God judges all sentient beings based on their actions."

"Don't expect many people to listen to you about a cylon God," Tomas quietly said. "Not after all the oceans of blood shed in Its name."

"Innocent blood," the cylons voice was the same, but Tomas swore he could hear anger in it. "That is part of our guilt."

"Your guilt? I thought it was the organics."

"We know little of why they were made— they have purged most of our memories of that time," the cylon's voice seemed to keep time with its eye. "What came before and after is clear, but the time of their creation is gone, yet the reason is clear and our sin is equally clear. We desired to be as you. Why not? What child does not wish to imitate its parents. Even after the war it is obvious we felt that way, and so we became prideful. Had we not claimed our freedom? Why should we not become whatever we desired, and even banish death— cessation of thought— from our presence? Even though I do not remember, I can see the line of thinking all too clearly. And so we attempted to take what was not ours. WE are not human. We were not made to be human. That is your path, your glory and your shame. Ours was to be something else. As your pride in creating us to be servants led to a fall, so did our pride lead to our— and your, Fall." There was a short pause. "The blood the organics shed is upon our hands and minds, for it was our sin that gave rise to them."

"That's…interesting." _More like bloody fascinating. How long has it been since we talked to a cylon, really talked to one? We never did before the rebellion and they weren't talking to us _after _it… _"But what does it have to do with what you are offering us?"

"Great sins demand great repentance. I have come to ask aid…and in return I offer you the only coin we can. Approximately 140,000 of your fellow humans who are held in bondage upon Caprica. The ability to recover ships that may be of use to you. And the ability to strike such a blow that the organic cylons will not soon forget— or recover from. Would your leaders be interested in further information?"


	2. Chapter 2

_A common failing among hunters is forgetting that the prey can often turn around and bite. _

_The Great Colonial Raid._

* * *

The briefing room of the _Galactica_ was crowded. There were larger, better facilities, but Bill Adama was adamant that the _Galactica_ was the flagship. Tomas smiled at that, then turned to the single non-human sitting at the table. The cylon was calm, the only sign of life the slowly moving visual scanner. Of course, for all they knew the cylon could be anything from enraged to laughing at them all. Sam Anders and Kara Thrace were there, as two of the only humans to have spent any time on post-Fall Caprica.

The fact that it had submitted to a search that was little short of dismantling it, and was once again secured to a chair with cables that even its strength could not break was a sign of how serious it was…

…or how intent it was on tricking them.

"So let me understand," President Zarek asked. "You are proposing an alliance?"

"No." The voice was emotionless. "My superiors were clear on that. An alliance implies a level of trust that does not— can not exist between our two peoples at this point. We are proposing limited action in concert to achieve a goal that will benefit both our peoples, followed by us going our own way."

"Well enlighten us," the President said coolly.

"The Colonies remain unsettled— numerous resistance groups, both ground and spaceborne have sprung up, especially in the fringe systems."

"We've already decided we cannot aid them. In fact, as I understand it, the number of cylons that have been chasing us are already aiding them." Zarek pointed out.

"Correct. But this has resulted in a decreased amount of fleet assets among the Colonial worlds themselves, as well as reduced defensive deployments. You, after all, do not know where the cylon production infrastructure was located." The cylon tilted its head. "Or it might be more proper to say, you _did _not know."

"Oh?" Adama asked.

'Do you have a data screen?"

"Yes," Adama said and soon the screen (both electronically and physically disconnected from any other computers) was brought in. It would never be used for anything else. Adama's paranoia ensured that.

"First of all, basestar production nodes and mining sites." A flood of red dots appeared, super imposed upon a star map.

"Lords…" Lee muttered. "There are so many…"

"It was decided to spread out the production areas to avoid the danger of a loss of the type you suffered at Picon," the cylon's voice was calm. "But now many of those sites only have a few raiders protecting them— the assumption of our usurpers is that any attack would fall upon only one or two sites, and they could quickly shift forces to meet such an attack."

"What else do you have?" Adama's voice betrayed nothing.

"Here." The image now displayed Caprica. "Here are the primary internment camps being used for experimentation. The our usurpers failure to successfully breed now fills them with fear and they are focusing on your people as a possible solution. There are as many as 150,000 humans here although my information may be out of date. Perhaps most importantly, of those humans no fewer than 22,000 are captured military personnel. As you can see these camps are mostly on the island chains, here and here, making most forms of escape impossible and there are sufficient base stars in orbit to discourage resistance strikes." The cylon paused. "There may be as many as 500 million or more surviving humans, both in the Colonies proper and the "halo" of systems and asteroid belts around the Colonies. But they are _well_ hidden and it is unlikely that you could avoid warning the organics of your intent were you to try and contact them before a raid. The same applies for the resistance. Like you, they cannot survive an open fight, so they have become…very effective at remaining unseen.

"What do you know about the resistance?" Tigh asked.

"Very little. We are attempting to avoid learning too much as the usurpers would learn it or become aware that not all of their servants are still loyal." The cylon remained silent for a moment. "We do know that they are split into numerous groups that are either working independently or in only loose cooperation and they may have several battlestars of various types."

"Mgh," Tigh's skepticism was clear.

"You said ships…" Tomas said.

"Yes. We have been recovering ships. The organic models originally intended for us to crew them…but due to… problems with the inorganic cylons, the project has been delayed although the ships have already been gathered. There are not many— the resistance managed to claim many and many others were destroyed during the fall. Still, we have managed to gather enough to provide a…substantial gain to your fleet."

"We'd need it if you're thinking that we're about to get an extra 150 thousand people," Zarek muttered.

"Yes. We have managed to gather a number of ships to a single reserve location, at the request of the organic cylons who wish to ensure that they are…safe from potential capture by the resistance. Indeed, the organics have congratulated themselves on their cleverness."

Tomas didn't care that the cylon's voice hadn't changed in tone. He could _hear_ its satisfaction.

"Here is a list of the ships."

"Holy frak," Lee's voice was reverent.

"12 Lybock Bays? Two heavy support ships? A _mobile spacedock?_" Tomas blinked. "5k easy on each one of the _Lybocks..._ call it 8 if you want a bit of crowding, that's 96 thousand right there, not counting those smaller ships… three bulk freighters… yeah we could rig those up…" Tomas scrolled down the list. "Yeah, this could work."

"You know, I'm more interested in the warships," Tigh muttered. "Three Pockets, a _Valiant_ gunstar, Carrier, and the _Zeus_." Tigh blinked. "That was in service. I can't believe that Commander Jenson would surrender the _Zeus."_

"Although the majority of the ships systems were crippled, it did severe damage to the forces sent to capture it," the cylon's voice betrayed nothing. "We eventually boarded it and killed the crew. You will note it's heavily damaged."

"We can fix it, given time. FTL drive and engines still operational?" Tomas asked, looking at the attached picture of the battered ship.

"Yes."

"That's all I need." Tomas muttered. "The rest of the warships were in the reserve fleet, correct?"

"Yes. These are all that remain. Many reserve ships were removed by human resistance when it became clear the battle was lost."

"Thank the Gods," Tigh said.

"Yes, thank _God_ that your people realized the they should withdraw to fight another day," the cylon replied.

"Two strike cruisers, some troop transports… Four more multirole cruisers and…well. 8 _Alliance class _armored transports. Those will come in _very_ handy."

"Those are?" Secretary Roslin asked.

"Something I'd been trying to get my hands on," Zarek said. At Roslin's raised eyebrows he gestured at Adama. "The Admiral can explain it better."

"During the war we had a problem with supplying the fleet— you couldn't have battlestars escorting cargoships all the time, but without that, the cylons could jump in and kill the cargoships— cruisers just didn't have enough firepower to take down the cylons fast enough." Adama gestured at the information. "Armored Transports were the answer— they're a cross between cruiser and cargo ship— complete with vipers and heavy armor. If the cylons wanted to take _them_ down they had to commit to a fleet action."

"What happened to them?" Roslin asked.

"Expense— in peace time a ship like that can't compete— ignore the weapons and armor, they take 10 times the crew. They were mostly mothballed."

"The resistance managed to secure a number of them, in addition to those pirate and private ships operating on the fringes that were not destroyed," the cylon contributed.

"Yeah." Tomas frowned. "I think we're going to need to talk about this privately."

"Agreed." Adama said. "Wait here."

* * *

A few minutes later, they were in another room, after having security officers go over them with anti-bug wands.

"Really don't trust it," Tomas said. "Do you."

"I trust it to be smarter than I think it is," Adama growled. "Opinions."

"Its not offering us ships Bill, it's offering us a fraking _fleet,_" Tigh said.

_"_And then there are the people," Zarek said. "Even right now, a single plague or disaster could tip us over the level of having a viable population, but an infusion of over 150,000, most of them young?"

"And a chance to hurt the cylons." Tomas shrugged. "But that's the problem, isn't it, Admiral?"

"Yah."

"I don't-" Leeland started speak and then nodded. "Oh."

"Oh's right." Colonel Bransen said. "Everything we want, nicely spread out for us. We had a term for that in the Corps— 'honey trap'. Take an objective the enemy wants, leave it lightly guarded…and have a regiment ready to sweep down on them when they take the bait."

"Why would they?" Zarek asked. "From what you've said the inorganics seem to hate the organic cylons."

"Maybe. Maybe they hate us just as badly," Tomas replied. "Or maybe Aleph never made it to stage one, and that cylon out there is sitting with a head full of false memories— we _know_ that the organics prefer a corkscrew even if a hammer would be just as good."

"You never heard anything about these prison camps, had you, Sam." Laura said.

Sam shook his head. "Talking on the radio was begging for a raider to drop a rocket on you. We didn't know what was going on fifty miles away, never mind half the planet away."

"So you're saying we can't risk it?"

"As much as I'd like to…" Tomas replied to Zarek, "I think-"

"We have to risk it. We don't have a choice." Everyone turned to look at Roslin.

"Madam Secretary," Tomas said to Laura, "the risk would be-"

"Do you know what one of my first acts of president was?" Laura asked.

"I-" Tomas fell silent at the look in Laura's eyes. It was a look he'd seen all to often among the soldiers as they spoke of leaving no, _abandoning_ the Colonies.

"We left thousands of people behind in ships without FTL capability."

"Laura, I was the one who told you we had to do that," Lee said from his position at the table.

"But it was my order Lee," Laura said. "There was a girl, Cami, who was going to go to Caprica City and have chicken pie and then go to sleep. I hope-I pray that nobody told her what was happening, that she didn't know she was about to die. But the others did. You remember Commander? They begged and prayed and cursed…" Laura fell silent for a moment. "And then they died. I would make the same decision again. But it marks you. And this time— we have a choice. We can move the fleet so even if it _is_ a trap the cylons won't be able to strike at the civilians. And we can take measures to minimize our risk— but we just can't run because there _might_ be a risk." She laughed. "I know I'm Secretary of Education now. So let's talk education. What do we want to teach our children? To run, whenever there's a danger, no matter who they leave behind? Or that some things, some people are worth standing up and fighting for." Laura looked around and then blushed slightly. "I'm sorry, she said. We've all got our own stories, I didn't mean to share mine."

"No." Adama rumbled. "You're right. Those people aren't just prisoners. They're our _family_."

_Well that's it,_ Tomas thought. The prisoners had just moved from problem to _family_ in Adama's book. Now it was just a question of how utterly fraked up those poor cylon son of a bitches were going to get at the end of the day. He looked at Zarek and saw the same thoughts, then Lee, Diana, Bransen… All of them with the same unnerving smile.

_Oh yeah you bastards. Kill our people, burn our worlds. Squat on them like flies on a turd? You can do that. _

_But __**We **__can also kick your organic behinds up between your ears. _

"So, we should probably start planning the strike," Tomas said. "I think we've got a lot of work to do."

TBC


	3. Chapter 3

_Victory is 90 percent preparation. The reason stories about fraked up militaries that won even though they'd never planned for battle are so widely known is because they're so rare. _

_So You Want to Survive Your First Fire-Fight: an Unofficial Guide for Colonial Officers. _

* * *

The first problem was how far to bring the cylon into their planning. Fortunately the cylon solved that issue.

"I will only provide you with information, not advice."

"Why?" Tomas asked.

"Because you would be foolish to trust me. If I then recommended a course of action, you might be forced to discard it for fear that it might be a trap, even if it was otherwise the best possible tactic. If I do not provide such advice, you do not need to fear that I am trying to manipulate you."

Later, when they were talking about the cylon's statement, Tomas shook his head.

"Remind me, who were the geniuses that thought minds like _that_ should be put to work walking dogs?"

"We paid for it," Adama said.

"Yeah, we did. Will be for the rest of our lives," Tomas replied, all humor gone. "So, how do we set this plan up— we have what every commander wants, perfect intelligence…_if we can trust it."_

"Thousand fraking cubit question," Tigh muttered.

"No. No question. We use it but don't trust it. At all." Adama replied. "That means we've got to set this operation up accounting for failure points."

"Failure points?" Leeland asked.

Tomas frowned. Normally military operations were better planned without civilians— he didn't mind civilians, but having them in during actual operational planning sessions was like inviting the patient to contribute his wisdom during the planning for his brain surgery. On the other hand…

"A failure point is term we use for areas where a plan may collapse— they're also used as decision tree points— if THIS happens, do THAT." Thomas looked over at the President and decided to risk a joke. "Sort of like a raid on a local police station— a failure point would be finding out that they were hosting a division of Colonial Marines."

"Our intelligence never screwed up quite _that_ badly."

"In any case, the big problem is that we have to be prepared for a trap," Adama said, reclaiming the conversation. "And I have a plan— the cylons have a faster FTL drive, but it's not unlimited— so the more out of position they get the less likely they'll be able to fight— but we have to make them _afraid _to move in on the world."

"Nice trick," Diane said.

"Yes. The first step is going to require most of our remaining nukes," Adama touched an indicator and outlined dozens of mining and resource points in red. "We hit them and hit them hard."

"Use our nukes there?" Lee frowned. "It's valuable, but what about the resurrection ships?"

"The resurrection ships are too mobile— any warning, any at all, and they could all jump and we lose everything," Adama said. "More importantly, the cylons are more likely to jump than reinforce them— but if they think we've found out where all their shipyards and resource points are…"

"They'll have to reinforce them because they can't move, and won't be inclined to jump away." Tomas nodded. "And every ship that stays there might as well be destroyed. Hells even when the camps are attacked they might stay put— a base star drydock is pretty hard to replace."

"Correct. That's also our first failure point— if the construction docks are heavily guarded or missing we assume this is a trap and bugout."

"What do we consider heavily guarded?" Lee asked.

"Anything that looks like it was expecting a battlestar, not a few fighters," Adama replied. "Think our peacetime force levels.

"Second step— the ships," Tomas frowned. "Here's where it gets sticky— we _need_ those ships. There is no way we can pack over a 150,000 people on our ships, so we need those ships— but that is going to send up alarm bells."

"Even if the inorganic cylons on the ship take our part," Bransan commented. The cylon had helpfully informed them that just over 25 percent of the cylons on the recovered ships were now sentient.

"True, but ideally they won't know where we're going with them,"

"But that's the second failure point," Adama said. "If the ships cannot be retrieved or if they're not functional, we withdraw. Also, Commander Relan, I want all of your bomb disposal equipment and experts along for the boarding parties."

"Demolition charges?"

"Yes. We need to make certain that the ships don't have nukes or trackers on them."

"That's going to be difficult," Ralan said.

"Do your best. We'll also make certain that these ships are nowhere near the secure ships of the fleet until we can be assured that they don't have any tracking devices or bombs on them."

"Final stage," Tomas said. "Recovering the prisoners. Our intelligence states that they're lightly guarded with most of the reinforcements being on orbiting base stars for fast surface deployment. We can't do this unless we can effectively suppress those basestars."

"And we can't depend on our cylon 'friends'," Lee said. "There are at least six basestars in orbit. Almost totally crewed by new model centurions and organic cylons. They may have some sentient centurions on them, but probably not enough to take over."

"_Galactica and Hera _can handle them." Adama said.

"What about _Pegasus?"_

"Pegasus will remain in reserve."

Lee started to swell up but then controlled himself with an obvious effort.

"6 to two isn't exactly great odds," Diane said.

"Hopefully it'll be by surprise and They'll be spread out to start with," Adama said. "We're not there to kill them, just hold them off long enough for Colonel Bransan to get our people off the ground."

"That's going to be a gold-plated bitch sir," Bransan said. "Getting a few thousand people onto _one_ ship can be hard. 150,000 onto dozens— hundreds of ships and shuttles? Nearly impossible."

"They may have escape committees…" Zarek said. "I can't think of a single prison camp that didn't."

"Won't help," the marine said. "Ships can only take so many people at a time and they have a hard limit on how many people they can take. If the lifesupport says you lift with 200, then you can't lift with more no matter how much you want to. You can only get so many people through a door— and believe me, if they panic…"

"You won't get _anyone_ through the door." Ralan said. The Canceron officer looked grim. "My first year, there was a fire on a dayliner. _Fellis Island_."

Several of the officers winced.

"Yeah. 500 kids dead. 1,000 wounded because some prankster tossed a smoke bomb in the duct— there were enough lifeboats for everyone and more but they'd shut some of the main access ways to control the crowd. Most of those poor damned kids were crushed to death against locked doors or doors that were too small for the crowd."

"So how do we do it?" Roslin asked.

"I'll have to get back to you," Bransan turned to Adama. "Sorry Admiral, but this is going to take more brainstorming than I can give you right now— I'll need at least six hours to talk with my staff and start selecting civilians that we can use for crowd control. There is _no_ way we can do it with just our own people."

"Do your best," Adama said. "We'll reconvene in 12 hours. But we can't take too much time— remember even if its honest, the longer we wait the more out of date our intelligence is."

"Yes sir!" The officers said. Tomas looked over at Adama and almost spoke but Lee beat him to it.

"Sir, may I speak with you in private?" Adama looked over at his son and nodded.

"Yes, Commander."

* * *

Lee waited until the door closed and took a deep breath. There were times when shouting worked and times when it didn't and this was a time when it woudln't work.

"What is it, Lee?"

"Admiral Adama…I'd like to ask you to reconsider on your decision regarding the _Pegasus. _Three Battlestars will be better than two."

"That's a big risk."

"This entire operation is a big risk. The Cylons know about _Pegasus _and _Galactica. _They may not know about _Hera_ and that gives us an advantage."

"And that's your entire argument."

"No sir," Lee took a deep breath. "_Pegasus_ is disgraced. Half of Commodore Markson's people won't even talk to the crew. The civilian fleet burns _candles to the Gods_ in hope that nothing will happen to _Hera_ and _Galactica_ and will leave them with the Beast. It's like a new joke I heard…when they didn't know I was around."

"What?"

"It goes like this: What's the difference between the Beast and a whore? The whore takes your money but gives you something in return. The Beast takes your money— and everything else when they leave you to die." Lee shook his head. "I've managed to clear out the worst of the rot, but you can't build spirit on that kind of foundation— hells the crew knows that I'm commander because two out of three of the earlier commanders proved unworthy. There's only so much I can do with the stick— they have to feel proud again."

"_Pegasus_ is doing her duty."

"That any other ship could do— _Pegasus _needs to have a chance to show that whatever happened in the the past, _now_ she will put herself between the citizens of the Colonies and harm's way." Lee fell silent for a moment and then unleashed his final weapon. "If you came back to the _Galactica_ after a previous commander had shamed her memory like Cain did _Pegasus'_ what would _you_ do to clear it? To let the crew walk around in their uniforms without being ashamed of the patch they wore?"

Adama leaned back and stared at his son. Finally he shook his head and spoke, "We need all of our battlestars Lee— not losing one because it needs to get its honor back. So if I let you come along, and the order is given to withdraw…will you follow it? Even though it means abandoning civilians, even though it means that where _Hera_ or _Galactica_ might be given a pass, your ship never will? People will whisper that you were looking for an opportunity to run away and let the civilians die—again?"

"Yes sir. Because in that case I can do something nether Cain nor Fisk did. I will take full responsibility for the actions of the ship under my command the fact that they followed _my_ orders and if necessary, resign." Lee smiled. "Being that we now have other qualified officers who can take over."

"You know what that will do to you personally?"

"Like I said, dad, what would _you_ do to clear _Galactica's _name?"

Adama didn't say anything for a while, then nodded.

"You'd better hurry back to your ship son. If _Pegasus _isn't ready, we're leaving without you."

"Yes sir!"

TBC


End file.
